‘Poldark’ Season 2 Premiere Recap: Ross Goes Full Prick

Poldark, that dastardly rogue, that smoldering rapscallion, that beefcake wheat farmer, is finally back! He is! He’s returned to us with a second season featuring more adventures, more soft core offscreen sex scenes, and more pretty coastal sunsets. So let’s get into it!

Season One ended with a literal shitstorm of tragedy. People died, a baby died, and our fearless hero Ross Poldark (Aidan Turner) was arrested for totally being a dick. (I’M SORRY BUT HE KIND OF HAD IT COMING TO HIM.) So I suppose you want me to dive into the plo–wait, what’s that? You want to know if there are steamy sex scenes again? Oh, yes, there are. They are so steamy that I’m pretty sure the director created some artificial steam to smudge the lens so we couldn’t get a good look at Aidan Turner and Eleanor Tomlinson‘s kibbles and bits.

Do you know what I like about Poldark’s sex scenes? How not explicit they are. Sure, there’s actually nudity this season, but we don’t see it because this is PBS, where the naked body is a philosophical concept like God or communism or the life’s work of Irving Berlin.

Now, if Ross and Demelza don’t do it for you, there’s a new flirt in town. Her name is Caroline Penverlaine-no-Pevensie-no that’s not right-Penvenen. Yes, Caroline Penvenen. She’s played by Cressida Bonas’s legal stepsister and her rich uncle is played by Midsommer Murders dreamboat John Nettles.

Caroline is an unabashed flirt, which is okay in 18th century society because she’s pretty and has a lot of money. Although it seems like she’s being set up with a person literally named UNWIN TREVAUNANCE (played by sweet, dull Henry from Fleabag), she’s already set her sights on hunky doctor Dwight Enys. Shh! No one tell her Dwight’s last girlfriend was a married woman who was strangled to death by her husband! It will ruin the crackling ambiance of these jolly little scenes!

Anyway, what I like most about Caroline is that she carries a pug like a baby and uses said pug as her primary mode of seduction. It reminds me that I should get a pug. Then I, too, could be could be a beautiful blonde aristocrat in the 18th century. That’s all it takes, I hear.

So, Caroline and Dwight will bone later this season. I’m sure of it.

Moving on… Ugh, Elizabeth. So pretty, yet so boring. I wish someone more vibrant was the lynchpin of a veritable love pentacle. Elizabeth is once more torn between her love of Ross and Francis (and her interest in maybe using her body to game Warleggan into getting what she wants). There’s stuff where Elizabeth tries to take the high road and comfort a preggers Demelza. There’s also stuff where she expresses concern for Francis — WHO WE ARE LED TO BELIEVE COMMITS SUICIDE.

But then it’s revealed he doesn’t.

So, yeah, there’s some Poldark family drama in this episode. Verity shows up and tried to make nice with Francis, who is cool with her, but still wants to kill her husband. Warleggan buys Elizabeth and Francis’s son a hobby-horse, which I’m sure is a veiled reference to something. Then old Aunt Agatha has gone full hag.

It’s great, but the main thrust (heh) of this episode is Ross Poldark’s valiant fight against the law. See, George Warleggan has put all his money into making sure that Poldark hangs. He even wrote and anonymously published a pamphlet detailing his misdeeds, the scamp! Needless to say, Ross is so stressed out that he’s taking it out on a cavern wall.

Still, he’s trying to make things right by Demelza. They enjoy a few lovely hours making out in the glory of nature and I feel very strongly that if I was the showrunner, all of Poldark would be just this.

Before his big trial, Ross consults with his lawyer who explains to him that the law is not about justice. The law is about who tells a prettier story to a judge and jury. Ross would understand this if he knew about Making a Murderer, Serial, The Night Of, The People v. O.J. Simpson: American Crime Story, or the entire Law & Order franchise. However, Ross doesn’t know about television for he is a rakish rogue living in the 1780s. All he knows about is brandy, gambling, copper-mining, horseback-riding, hot sex, and the truth. He makes an impassioned plea on behalf of justice as a concept and I know for a fact that he would love Sarah Koenig just as surely as I know that he is doomed.

Just as this is all going down, tensions are high in the town. The economy is failing and there’s this new thing called “democracy” that’s doing well abroad. That’s a problem because it’s also time for elections. UNWIN THE UNWORTHY wins with the rich folk’s support, but gets immediately bullied by the poor folk in town. One of these poor folk gets thrown in the slammer and then sent to the gallows for his insubordination. You see, everyone’s really afraid of a French Revolution happening in Cornwall. It’s their nightmare: the Cornish Revolution!

And that’s really what’s at stake in Ross’s trial. See, his crime has been set up as a metaphor for revolution. He incited the poor, starving townsfolk to mob the Warleggans’ shipwreck. He wanted to topple the aristocrats. Ross Poldark is a Republican! (But not the kind who would vote for Trump – he’d probably write in himself.) So after having his name dragged through the mud by various paid off witnesses, Poldark must rely upon himself to save himself.

It looks grim, and gentle readers, it is. Ross starts off reading a prepared statement begging for the court’s mercy, but then he can’t resist. He goes full dick! He goes full Ross Poldark! He turns into the love child of Abraham Lincoln and Barack Obama. His oratory skills are off the chart. Aaron Sorkin, are you writing this down? Poldark literally argues his way out of the noose – all while being an arrogant prick!

Guys, I love Ross Poldark so much.

You know what I also love? That he and Demelza are free to bone again. (And there’s a baby on the way!)